“The authorities in astronomical chronology made their calculations and announced their expert results. The authorities in pottery took the results of thespecialists’ computation as a firm base on which to build. Authorities in thehistory of art, religion, philology, and history in general followed. Difficultieswere swept away. Thus there came into existence an elaborate entrenchedsystem, rooted in fallacy, that bears very little resemblance to the real past.”~Mortals in Amnesia: Vol VI: The Test of Time, by Yman Veli’kosyk

“What do you mean he was exsanguinated?!” asked Ulm-Aaa-Janzikek of theHistorical Council. “Why wasn’t this information made public two yearsago at the time of death?”

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Janzikek was a reptilian Tiss’shar and one of the rare Isk-ar albinos. Known for hisseminal work, Minds and Perceptions: A Comparative Study of Persuasive Techniques Duringthe Galactic Civil War, he was also one of the Historical Council’s most perspicacious…and tenacious members. 

“Chandrilan authorities are not accustomed to crimes of that sort,” Voren Na’al replied. As Archivist Emeritus of the Historical Society and one of the leading members ofthe Historical Council, Na’al was to serve as an impartial moderator on the matter ofreleasing the late Arhul Hextrophon’s final work to the public, though many questionedthat impartiality. As a younger man, he had been Hextrophon’s protégé, and they hadremained friends over the years. “That Hextrophon had been a Major, Executive Secretary, and Master Historian for Alliance High Command meant that both GalacticAlliance and Chandrilan security forces were involved. With each wanting a clean fieldin which to investigate, it was decided to keep the media out for a time. Then came theSwarm War, and we found ourselves facing more immediate concerns.”

“This information, while unpleasant, changes nothing,” Abric Hanapen complained.A long-standing member of the Council, the Velmoc had complained long and loudseveral times already. “By his own admission, Hextrophon’s final years were spent on aghost hunt, travelling to strange galactic corners in search of fairy tales. There’s notelling what enemies he might have made. I see no correlation between the manner ofhis death and any so-called ‘prophetic’ component in his writings.”

“Then you’re blind!” Mungo Baobab spat. “If you read the journal, as you claimed,you’d see that the manner of death is exactly as Hextrophon wrote would occur. Or areyou purposely trying to obfuscate the facts?”

“Mr. Baobab,” cautioned long-time Council member Donn Gulek, Chief Historian ofthe Kellmer Institute of Galactic History. “I’m certain we don’t need to remind you thatas an honorary member, you were asked here to observe and provide testimony—not lobaccusations against voting members of the Council.”

With the decorum borne from decades in the intergalactic art and antiquities, theelderly but still energetic Baobab proferred an apology. His wife, Auren, squeezed hishand and gave him a private smile. She knew that her husband was at that momentkicking himself for having retired from active participation on the Council. It had been a necessary evil caused by the stress they’d unvaryingly caused. He’d had an easier timeon Roon fighting Governor Koong.

Na’al sympathized. For all their purported civility, the Council could behave likewild neks at times, and so far, at least half had bared their fangs. If this was how theSenate debated, it was a wonder anything got accomplished…

Only two hours into the second day of debate, and the Council remained more divided than ever, with neither side making much headway. Everyone was supposed to haveread the controversial journal in question, colloquially titled different things by differentpeople. Some called it The Cosmic Wars of Ancient Skyriver, The Last Days of Arhul Hextrophon, or Supernatural Encounters, but most simply called it “Hextrophon’s Manuscript.”Na’al surmised that the majority hadn’t actually read it and knew of it only by hearsayand whatever sensational or exaggerated reports were told to them by the few that had.Given that the galaxy had become tantalized by the secrets of the mysterious journal, nodoubt fueled by the newsnets’ charges of “suppression” on the part of the Council, notto mention the recent Killik activity (one of the ancient races that the document touchedon) and the revelation of Hextrophon’s murder. It had become a matter that could nolonger be ignored or delayed.

The manuscript could be released by any one of Hextrophon’s supporters, and severalpublishing houses had expressed interest in distributing it, but given his reputation, thatwould be a sign of rejection on the part of the Council itself, which would be taken tomean they deemed the work spurious; an ignominious fate for he who’d been one of themost celebrated members of the Council. On the other hand, the Council could publishit, but any individual member had the right to forego their personal affidavit or theofficial attestation of their university. This was not uncommon, of course, as historiansfrequently disagreed, but in this case—with so large a number of members against thework—many would undoubtedly withhold their avouchment and publicly disavow it,which would give the impression that Na’al and his companions were playing favoritesand, in effect, render the work spurious.

Perhaps worse was the perception, however true, that the Historical Society was divided and ineffectual; this at a time when the yet tumultuous Galactic Federation of FreeAlliances funded them with growing circumspection while ever louder voices urged itsprivatization. That would prove disastrous. No one had forgotten COMPNOR and thechilling effect that organization had had on knowledge and truth. This would be nodifferent, giving private and corporate backers with personal, political, and financialagendas undue influence over policy and publication decisions.

As if that wasn’t going on already, Na’al thought sourly. Various scholars and universitiesclaimed impartiality, but anyone with open eyes knew it was more complicated than that.Academics and chancellors made speeches about integrity, but were no less susceptible tocredit chips, power, and prestige than anyone else. Another challenge was the institutionalbias that had crept in over the years, creating an environment of homogeneous thought,intellectual conformity, and deference to hierarchical power structures.

“I will never accept as fact a supernatural premise for the foundation of sapient life!”Hanapen pontificated dramatically to the resounding approval of his supporters.

“No one is asking that you do,” responded Tchaka Marshall, Senior Professor of KallaUniversity, nephew of the famous Roundtree scholar, Rekkon, and a renowned historianin his own right, “merely that you allow others to have the opportunity to decide forthemselves whether there is merit in this work. Suppressing his writings is not the wayto ensure that everyone goes along with your conclusions.”

“The majority of us have already decided,” retorted Dee Savyest, the ruffled Head ofResearch at the Mrlsst Trade and Science Academy. “This is a waste of time!”

“I have to agree,” Reina Solov stated in her usual, matter-of-fact way. “I’m not sure Iunderstand why we continue to debate this.” Professor of Archaeology at the Universityof Byblos, and one of the more moderate members of the Council, Solov’s specialty wasancient cultures. Unlike Hextrophon, however, she had taken a decidedly drier approachto the subject as she had to most aspects of her life. “The war may have prevented inquiryinto this material until now, but if not for the requests of Archivist Emeritus Na’al—andthe fact that Hextrophon’s name is attached to it—we all know the journal would havebeen relegated to the SDs long before.”

The Spurious Directories, or SD files, were repositories for ideas that had beendeemed erroneous, and included wild assertions, unsupported hypotheses, and disproven theories. Many came from non-members, media figures, fringe academicians,and pseudoscientists, but there were a significant number of older suppositions andconclusions that had once been accepted as fact by historians in the distant past. That theSD files were kept at all was a minor miracle, but the Historical Council of prior yearshad been more open to alternate possibilities than those in authority today.

Solov had a point, Na’al had to admit. But just thinking that felt like betrayal. The factof the matter was that it was simply too bizarre. Historian Palob Godalhi had privatelyconfessed to him that he felt the same way, and if it came down to a vote, as it likelywould, he’d have to vote against publication by the Council. It’s not that he didn’tbelieve Hextrophon. He believed that he believed it—he just couldn’t accept his conclusions, leaving the most reasonable deduction that Arhul was in severe psychologicaldistress due to the nature of his work.

Savyest now tried to appear reasonable. What came across instead was condescension: “Hextrophon was, no doubt, a legend in his time,” offered the azure-faced avian,“and a colleague and friend to many of us, but we cannot ignore centuries of culturalstudies in favor of a fantastic myth replete with a pantheon of gods and demons whopresent unsubstantiated threats to the galaxy. The galaxy has enough real problemswithout resurrecting fables from the distant past.”

“Myths and fables!” bellowed renowned Senior Anthropologist Mammon Hoole. “Icannot decide whether this body is supercilious or just senseless!” Hoole did not easilybecome agitated. He held a reputation of being able to maintain an even temper in theface of beasts, younglings, and marauding monsters, but when it came to the intractability of the Council, he found his patience stretched past its breaking point. “Science does not have gatekeepers. It does not shunt aside questions or challenges to the status quo, nordoes it rigidly adhere to established ideas if new evidence sheds clearer light on amatter. Our field should be free of dogma. We are not priests proclaiming incontrovertible truths, nor worshipers at the altar of consensus. This scorn of anything outside of theestablished consensus, which is a century and a half old, has long been crushing curiosity and stifling inquiry. How soon we’ve forgotten the many scientific proofs that werelater found to be in error due to faulty, theoretical foundations or inaccurate interpretations of data. If Hextrophon is seen as a heretic now, well… good for him! We should allendeavor to follow his example and question the foundations of our teachings! But I seethat many of you have no interest in investigating his claims—only dismissing them!”

“If someone is going to overthrow the established models,” Gulek replied calmly,“then the burden of proof falls on him to provide sufficient evidence, and I, for one, don’tbelieve he does. If you want to stake your reputation on a weird holothriller with unsupported conjectures, that’s your business, but it doesn’t make us biased to reject it.”

“Except that I know all of you,” Hoole countered, “and the complacency that has taken over. Hextrophon is hardly the first to have asserted ‘unsupported conjectures,’ orhave you already forgotten Doctor Bowen? Assuming he is still held in high regard bythe Obroan Institute, then you know he believed the Celestials created, and I quote, ‘Notjust our galaxy, but, indeed, our entire universe… They engineered the Hyperspacebarrier that surrounds our galaxy, either to protect themselves against invasion or toprevent the return of beings they had exiled from this galaxy. Perhaps both.’”

Hanapen, Savyest, the majority of Lekua University, and most of the members of theObroan Institute—all staunchly conservative—stirred uncomfortably in their seats at thereminder of Bowen’s problematic quote. It hadn’t escaped Hoole’s notice that a numberof them had published or were preparing for publication their own systemizations ofPre-Republic history, which were not only countered but wholly overthrown by theconclusions of the far more well-known, and well-liked, Hextrophon.

“Yes, but he ascribed that group to the Rakata,” interjected Professor Roi Tenne fromthe Obroan Institute, one of the more hyperpartisan members of that body.

“Who were also at one time regarded as a myth!” Hoole countered. “It doesn’t matterwho the Celestials might be identified with as much as the fact that a respected man ofscience once asserted the idea that they engineered our universe! Hextrophon hassimply uncovered an older race that better fits the patterns of evidence.”

“Or returned to a discarded view that science has since overturned,” Janzikek countered over the rising tumult. “And this evidence you speak of presents your own race ashaving been genetically bred as monsters and spies! Really, Hoole, I’m surprised at you.”

“Truth must come before foolish pride.” Hoole was forced to roar over the noise ofthe crowd. “And ancestry has nothing to do with anything—or would you condemn theSkywalkers for the blood that flows through their veins?!”

Janzikek snorted at what he considered a cheap shot, but it silenced most, if only for amoment. Hoole was seated alongside his wife, Hectia Ruluth-Hoole. In their section alsosat her best friend, Odon Grimar, a Devaronian geologist, along with several who had personally known Hextrophon or respected him, and a number of younger colleagueswho knew him only by reputation. While many of these agreed with his findingsbecause they harmonized with their own discoveries, most did so privately.

Taking advantage of the opening, Hectia stood up from her seat. At just over one anda half meters, she was considerably shorter than her husband but no less fearless. “Look,I may not have a pod in this race like some of you, but I’m a scientist myself and havespent years in your company. All my husband and I are asking is that you keep yourminds open and don’t be afraid to take a stand. This is not the Empire.” Hoole lookedproudly at his wife. He had fallen in love with her for her forthrightness and magnanimity of spirit; when it came to clear matters of right and wrong, she suffered no fools.

Her appeal had been made to those too afraid to speak up. Hectia and Mammon haddiscussed their frustrations the prior night over a hot cup of ola tea and keela. Whilesome of the newer members chafed at the Council’s unyielding rigidity in the face ofanything that deviated from traditional thinking, they were also afraid of the repurcussions of honesty. Even some of the older members had grown cautious. That meant thatHextrophon’s opponents had the advantage. They could be openly committed to theirworldview, as it drew upon the systemic body of work that had been developed over thedecades, while those on the other side, fearful of exclusion, would pragmatically waituntil a consensus was reached before going along with whatever the majority decided.

“I see this has become open-mic night,” groused Hanapen. Hectia rolled her eyes butotherwise ignored him. “You’re a botanist, not a historian. I am not sure you are qualifiedto speak on these matters.”

“Let her speak, Hanapen,” Na’al reprimanded. He knew Abric to be curmudgeonly,but never as mean-spirited or ill-mannered as he’d been of late. He wondered if Velmocswent through midlife crises like some Humans did.

“We understand Mammon’s position,” Janzikek said in a conciliatory tone. “It’s hardly subtle, though the way you say it is far nicer. You could learn a lot from her, Hoole!”

“Don’t I know it?!” Hoole bellowed. The attendees laughed, a rare moment of levity.

Inspired by Hoole’s anthropological studies, Hectia and her Valkyrie team hadformed shortly after university. Utilizing Imperial grants, they traveled to undiscoveredand newly discovered planets to study their ecosystems in the hopes of conserving thembefore they were colonized or exploited. They naïvely believe the Empire supportedtheir research out of the same love of discovery and knowledge. When they discoveredotherwise, they stopped accepting grants and turned independent. This proved no easytransition. To fund private research, they started selling interesting or unique naturalitems—minerals, gems, and plants—after studying and cataloguing them. Tragically,Odon’s sister, Lorol, had misguided loyalties and resented the loss of a stable income,arguing that the Imperial Land-Management Programme was within their legal rights todo as they saw fit. When the crew of the Valkyrie went off to assist Hoole and the Arrandas, whom they’d met on one of their excursions, and their Bothan engineer, Hird Sohor,announced that she was leaving to join her cousins in the Alliance, Lorol turned them in.Biology illustrator Jippil Fiss was killed and Odon and Hectia were forced into hiding.

“I won’t deny that when Mammon first introduced me to Hextrophon’s manuscript,I was taken aback.” There had been considerable discussion the previous day as towhether or not it should be disqualified on the grounds that it wasn’t structured in therigorous way that was customary for academic papers. “I couldn’t see how he’d haveknown the private thoughts and conversations of people who had been dead for aeons…” She got a hearty assent from the opposition. “Graf-Well calls it the ‘third-personomniscient narrator,’ but I was a bit unnerved by it, thinking, maybe he had gone a littlemad. But then it occurred to me: what is the most commonly uncovered literary form?”She didn’t have to wait long for an answer. Several shouted it. “That’s right. Biographies, histories, and stories. We are a storytelling people. Right now, on my datapad, Ican pull up Darth Maul’s journal or Han Solo’s for that matter. Take away all the ritualsand spells and what are holocrons but journals? We have personal diaries of AnakinSkywalker and the lover of the Despot Queen of Shikaakwa. And we didn’t even knowof their existence until years after the New Republic was established.”

The Emperor’s restrictions had prevented the publication of anything outside of Imperial-sanctioned propaganda. This created a backlog of material that libraries aroundthe galaxy could not make public and had to be kept hidden in case of a surprise Imperial inspection. With the fall of Palpatine, it took decades to catalogue and digitallycollate these collections so that they were accessible. Some of this work had already beendone in secret, but the rush to release material pertaining to the Clone Wars and rise ofthe Empire led to several seemingly conflicting accounts that were still being untangled.

“Datapads don’t last forever,” Tenne pointed out. “Even if we accept that Hextrophon came upon an ancient supercomputer known as the Keeper—”

“He didn’t make her up,” Hoole countered. “She’s the largest repository ofknowledge in the galaxy—even greater than Mistress Mnemos. She’d likely have hadtens of thousands of stories in her databanks.”

“That doesn’t make them true, and I’m not certain why you think it appropriate tolecture us,” Savyest griped, never good at reading a room. “You are free to believe inwhatever invisible, flying monsters you want, but this body’s reputation is at stake!”

“You are a most vexing bird, Savyest!” Hoole grumbled. “Is it our reputation thatyou’re worried about? Or your own prestige, grants, and holobook sales! Times likethese make me think we were better off under the Empire. Kept us honest!”

But that only started another uproar.